Driving a giant hot dog across the USA is only the second most interesting job on Seattle native Carly Koemptgen’s CV, after she won a global ‘dream job’ competition that includes touring New Zealand.
The 25-year-old recently landed in Auckland to begin her six-month journey across New Zealand and Australia as a ‘digital nomad’ marketer for global HR platform Deel, sharing how easy it is for people to work from anywhere in the world.
Carly’s job is a dream for many, especially for those of Generation Z who are ambitious to see the world, do something new every day and not be tied down to a routine.
But how did Carly end up on a plane to the Southern Hemisphere?
Heading into university, Carly first went down the path of going into business, but later realised that maths wasn’t her strong suit, nor did she want to put in the work to learn it.
Consulting with her academic advisor and exploring the options, Carly took the route of journalism, which combined her interests of writing and business.
“When I was getting ready to graduate, I realised that traditional journalism is adapting to the digital world and that I wasn’t going to go into writing for magazines or newspapers,” she says.
“So, I realised that I could take my storytelling skills and apply that to social media because a lot of businesses were starting to expand into social media during that time.”
As a young person, Carly saw potential for herself in the marketing industry where it was plastered with older professionals finding it difficult to wrap their head around the world of social media and the nooks and crannies of being relatable, all while telling stories in that format.
Realising she was at an advantage, Carly began rolling with that and working across multiple businesses as their social media manager, experiencing both the freelance and agency world.
While on this journey, Carly stumbled across the opportunity Deel was presenting that was “cool and unique”: working remotely from a van in New Zealand and Australia.
“I submitted my application through their website, but then they also wanted a short video kind of explaining why you’re the best person for the job,” she says.
“Because creating social media is a big part of this role, I figured that TikTok was going to be the best avenue to do that.”
In this day and age, Carly says that the use of TikTok is a crucial platform for marketing and if she was able to perfectly showcase that she could leverage the app, she would be able to show that she is perfect for the role.
“I understand that we do not have the experience in the traditional marketing world that the older generations do, but we also have very unique experience growing up with the internet and being consistently online,” she adds.
With her role at Deel, Carly will be able to do what she loves, which is storytelling on a digital platform, getting across the possibility to work anywhere in the world.
This is not her first time going on tour for work. Last year she lived on the road driving a huge hot dog across America.
“I have been freelancing, doing social media marketing and copywriting for clients for the last year. I left my agency job in pursuit of just a more flexible lifestyle, and I think I’ve achieved that,” says Carly.
“So ideally, my goal after this is to continue freelancing, continue being a digital nomad, continuing acquiring clients, not just in the United States, but globally as well.” Though being flexible has the challenge of sometimes not seeing the path ahead, Carly says it is “really exciting” to be participating in something innovative in the field of marketing.
This article was originally published in the March/April 2023 issue of NZ Marketing. Click here to subscribe.
